ISLAMABAD: The 15th General Conference and the 42nd annual gathering of the Asia Pacific Institute for Broadcasting Development (AIBD), which began in Tehran on Thursday, has devised a strategic plan to extend support to member broadcasting institutes to equip with digital technologies for broadcasting. While speaking at the conference on Friday, Information and Broadcasting Secretary Saba Mohsin Raza said that the technology-rich member countries of the institute could develop capacity of other member countries on digital broadcasting to reach to maximum people. She shared with fellow broadcasters that Radio Pakistan’s Facebook page has about 2.2 million likes and over 2.3 million followers around the world, said a press release issued. About 4,000 visits are recorded daily. Its posts reach to over 10 million Facebook users every day. The Radio Pakistan Twitter account is the leading social media icon in public sector, she said. Nearly two million people are following @RadioPakistan Twitter account and about 140 followers are being added on daily basis. Saba recommended that the institute’s future programme on trainings should include new themes such as addressing inequalities, climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction, and risk informed development and mobilisation of youth, women, children and minorities for development and creation of inclusive societies to achieve the sustainable development goals (SDGs). She called upon AIBD to diversify its training programme across geographical and thematic areas, extending it to member countries by sending AIBD trainers to the member countries to train maximum number of professionals. The information secretary expressed that the telecommunication, digital broadcasting, media reforms and convergence with online media are transforming the broadcasting into a new era of social reforms. The role of broadcasting in fostering development, alleviating poverty and creating responsive and informed societies has been well recognised as a complementing tool of development, she said. The broadcasting industry itself is undergoing a big transformative change and an unprecedented growth with the emergence of new developments in terms of digitalisation of equipment and broadcast spectrum, information and communication, internet and mobile technologies, she added.